This blog is a diary-type journal telling of daily happenings on the farm with family and friends. Feel free to join us at Woodsong if you are interested in rural life, writing, reading, grandkids, ducks, and other such everyday joys.

Thursday, July 18, 2013

Stuff (life) just keeps happening and does not seem to slow
down. Good things. Bad things. But too much at once. And lots of zucchini to cope with.

VBS came and went with little effort on my part but much
enjoyment with grandkids in the house.
Elijah was at our village church three Sundays recently, and I loved
hearing him sing. I loved having him and
Brianna with us as we studied Job in Young Adult Class. (And it was fun having Mary Ellen visit last
Sunday too, and then really nice to have her invite us all to lunch!)

The day before I had a wonderful unexpected treat when my
brother Jim and wife Vivian come down from Mattoon.
Frankly, they have had serious health problems that have made me wonder if
they’d be able to come for awhile. But
Vivian’s sister in nearby Vienna
was celebrating her 80th birthday, and they came down for the family
get-together there despite the tight medicine schedule they have to keep for
the time being. Jim called me the night
before, and Katherine insisted I leave for an afternoon break so I could see
them when they dropped by the farm on their way home.

Adding to our pleasure was finding out their daughters Judi
and Jane (Beth) were with them. I
relaxed thinking one of the daughters could drive if Jim got tired—but he left the
farm in the driver’s seat. Come to find
out when I called him today for his 85th birthday, he drove all the
way down (with a traffic jam that slowed them considerably in Marion) as well as all the way home. Although Jane would have been glad to drive,
he enjoyed making the long drive. I do
not think I could not make that trip
there and back in one day. And with
Katherine so sick, I haven’t tried to go up for an overnight visit as I used to
do. So it had been much too long since I
had seen them, and I was very grateful for their visit. Elijah and Brianna came in while they were
here, and I liked that they were able to see relatives they had not seen in
years. Vivian was especially pleased to
see Elijah because he received the first of many many baby blankets she has
made down through the years including ones for all of our grandchildren after
Elijah.

Another joy has been having Gerry and Vickie in the house yesterday
and today. They came by way of Dallas where Gerry had
helped in a softball clinic that our granddaughter Erin was having there. Then
they had driven all night and stopped at the farm for some sleep before coming
over and joining Mary Ellen and me at the hospital in Carbondale, where Gerald was having a
pacemaker implanted. They had to return
to Georgia
this afternoon, but Gerry retrieved his dad from the hospital this morning and
took him to breakfast at Cracker Barrel. I had a mite of trouble the first time
I saw Gerald in a hospital gown before the procedure, but he looked the picture
of health, and I felt confident that all would go extremely well and it did.

He had never spent a night in the hospital during our
marriage, and I’d planned to spend the night with him although I figured he
would protest. However, it turned out
that he was in a large ward with very
tight quarters, and they would not allow anyone to stay in there through the
night. I saw no point in trying to sleep on a
hard chair in a waiting room. So
I carried out the little bag I had
packed with a tooth brush and meds and came on home at the close of visiting
hours. It had been rewarding to watch the screen above his bed recording
dots every time the pacemaker helped his heart rhythm. We have to appreciate the modern miracles
that researchers and physicians have created for us. I have a feeling Gerald
will have more energy than ever now despite the fact that he already works more
than anyone his age ought to in his wife’s opinion. The big worry now is how we
will keep him following the doctor’s orders until the pacemaker settles in and
the incision heals.

Before this, Gerald has
been busy mowing the yard since he is not supposed to do so now for awhile and getting his garden in shape
and picking zucchini. On top of that, he
has been getting estimates and talking to insurance folk because last Friday I
needed to go to Herrin on an errand and I stopped by to leave zucchini and to
share a few Union County peaches that Bill Tweedy has brought us. I invited
Mary Ellen to go with me as I thought it
might give her a needed break from all the hard work they are involved in right
now with crops and kids and moving stuff down from Waggoner. Mary Ellen is an excellent driver and likes
to drive, and we followed our usual pattern of my handing her the car keys.

Just as I expected, we were having a good time talking and
laughing, when suddenly as we were driving along on the main street of Energy
we were rear ended with great force. I
never understood why, but a man had rammed into us. (The policeman said this
has kept happening but the man kept passing his driver’s exam and he did have
insurance. We sure hope.) We were shook up both physically and
emotionally, but we knew we came out of it with a minimum of damage considering
the jar we had. Dark bruises show where
my seat belt saved me from serious injury.
Otherwise, Mary Ellen and I were ok, and the car can be fixed.

Before Gerry and Vickie had to leave today, For our lunch I
made a zucchini casserole for a veggie to go with out baked pork chops and
instant mashed potatoes. I’d been
wanting to make a peach pie with the peaches so I did that for dessert.and used sweetener
instead of sugar as a welcome home gesture for Gerald. It was successful.

All in all, there is just too much going on right now and I must
take a break from blogging. I process
life by writing, and it is both relaxing and distracting for me to keep from
thinking of problems I cannot control.
All my life when I see something beautiful, I have wished I were an
artist and able to capture it permanently on paper. Instead I have to use words to try to make transient things
more permanent. But right now, maybe I need to save that writing time for more
important things. Maybe I should be the
one to start picking the zucchini.

Sunday, July 14, 2013

How can it be that our young people are not safe to walk in
their home neighborhoods at 7:30 in the evening?

How can it be that wearing a hoodie makes someone
suspicious?

How can it be that a court room lawyer would think it okay
to make bad jokes in front of parents
whose child had been shot?

How can it be that “educated” lawyers and some of the media
talked down to and failed to show respect to Trayvon Martin’s young friend who
gave an honest report--just because she was unsophisticated and uncomfortable testifying and could not read
cursive?

How can it be that persons claiming an unrecognizable voice
(according to the experts) were able to claim they knew it was their dear
friend George’s voice? And that
Trayvon’s mother did not recognize her own son’s voice?

How can it be that six women feel it is legal for a man to
shoot and kill an unarmed youth?

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Seems like yesterday that our grandkids first came to the
farm to be together and attend VacationBibleSchool
at our village church: Elijah, Trent,
Geri Ann, and Brianna. As usual, I was
helping there, so it was easy to take them along. For these preschoolers, staying
at the farm for that long with each other was a big deal. I slept upstairs with
them each night and we would tell stories and make sure no one became homesick.
I am guessing the two boys were four or five and the two little girls were
three or four. I was so proud having them attend with me. A cherished memory was going to the local
Kroger store and having those four following me like a line of little ducklings
across the parking lot and into the store.
As we marched, bystanders watched and smiled at their cuteness.

That was the same year, I believe, that their big afternoon
adventure at the farm was catching fish. At that time, we had two farm ponds
with one at a higher level than the other though they were a long way
apart. It was planned to allow the
higher pond to overflow with a wide shallow slice of running water gently
flowing across the meadow and finally our side lawn and down to the lower pond. That summer the stream of water was thick
with baby fish. The children were so
delighted to be able to grab the little fish in their hands and look at them
before letting them go on down to the lower pond.

After that, it became a tradition that the grandkids would
come and attend VBS together. I encouraged mud pie making, catching fireflies,
and other country past times. After we moved the half mile over to Woodsong
from Pondside Farm, that first year here we had some adjusting to do. A
favorite downstairs bedroom is completely underground and offers wonderful
darkness. We moved two queen size bedsteads
into that room with barely room to walk between the beds, but the kids and I
were able to sleep together there and continue telling stories and saying night
time prayers.

I think because Tara and Erin lived in our community up on
Route 166 during their earliest VBS attendance, they attended from home. Leslie
was still living in Carterville and went to VBS there I assume. For some reason
that first year Leslie did not come down from Freeport, but later she did. She also helped a year or so with the opening
music. (At night she was as great at telling ghost stories as at music, and I
had to put a stop to that when someone got too scared.) Tara and Erin came down from JohnstonCity
and helped too. Even Gma Shirley came from her church and helped one year when
we needed more workers. When Sam and Cecelie became old enough to attend VBS,
they joined the older kids. By this time, the cousins had grown very close and
were adept at making up their own games and activities. Geri Ann had to work around ball practices and
games sometimes but she was always here when possible, but then she moved to Georgia.

As the kids grew up and entered high school, they would
volunteer to be classroom helpers, so they continued to gather at the farm for
VBS when camp and summer activities allowed. This year Trent and Elijah have
completed their two years of college, but they are here to help teach. Soon to
be a high school junior, Sam too is again working
as he did in VBS at his own church. Brianna has little more than a month
until she starts her college career. Once again she is working with
preschoolers, and once again she gets to see the one special little girl that
comes to our VBS from a nearby church each year. They early bonded because just like Bri as a
preschooler, this quiet little beauty was very shy. They understood each other
intuitively. It was so sweet to see
their once-a-year friendship develop down through the years. There are other VBS
kids their own age that our grandkids have stayed close to through Tweets and
Facebook contact. I like to think the
children who have grown up to work in VBS are honing leadership skills that
will profit themselves and others for years to come.

For the first time in decades, I am not working in VBS this
year, and I don’t have to be sure to have adequate seat-belt spaces for
grandkids going with me. Their cars are
parked outside. I am enjoying hearing
the piano in the living room at Woodsong though and the four here this year creating
and practicing skits for opening exercises. I like hearing them debate what to
do with their free day time since VBS is at night this year. While I was in bed
this morning, Gerald said they got up early today and Sam scrambled eggs for
the gang.

Some things haven’t changed, however. There are ten pairs of
kicked-off shoes in the front hall the last I counted. Half devoured cans of soda are left around. Last evening after a swim in the lake, I
picked up wet towels to toss in the washer/drier because I don’t like them left
on carpeted floors. I enjoy it all because of all the magical memories that
started long long ago.

Friday, July 05, 2013

After a spate of company last weekend with the Eilers and the
Archibalds here, this week has been relatively quiet.We often do not know who might arrive during
the night and be sleeping in the next morning here at Woodsong.Gerald did know that Tara and Bryan and our
three great grandsons were coming to spend a day at the farm at the end of
their vacation on their way home to Georgia, and he had been making
sure the lime pile and toy machinery were ready for them.I knew Jeannie and Cecelie were coming “at
the end of the week,” but wasn’t sure when they would arrive.

I was spending the night at Katherine’s, and when Gerald woke
he could see who was in the house by the cars outside. Jeannie and Cecelie had
picked up Brianna over at her house, where their family has been this
summer—when they aren’t at Waggoner. Of
course, Mary Ellen came over the next day.
We liked it that it worked out so several of the family got to see “the
boys” who, of course, are greatly changed every time they visit with most
visits several months apart.

Jeannie came prepared with food and ideas and declared she
was cooking for all of us. We declared that her egg salad sandwiches for Friday lunch were the best we had
ever eaten. Since people often sleep late and are barely up for lunch or have
only recently eaten the bowl of cereal or toast, which is what they usually get
for breakfast here, the egg salad was a great idea. She also fixed supper that night, but the
Archibalds had needed to leave before then--knowing they would still arrive
home well after midnight.

As usual, the three little guys rode the tractor, the lawn
mower, the Gator, and played hard in and out of the house. Cecelie and Brianna enjoyed entertaining them
as well as Gerald. When I arrived home,
I played peep-eye with the shy one and gradually had my turn interacting with
each precious boy. Still in the flower
mode, Gerald took the boys to the fields and let them pick bouquets for their
parents. I was impressed that they made
sure their dad had a bouquet as well as their mama. Later when Maddux was yawning and a mite
cranky, his mother asked him if he was getting tired. He nodded yes and added, “From all that
flower picking.” It is always sad to see
them leave and we dreaded the long trip ahead for the parents, although they are
pretty accomplished at keeping the kids occupied or asleep.

The next day Elijah arrived driving down from IllinoisState, where he is taking some summer
classes and working. I think the grandkids
gathered up at Trent
and Brianna’s house on Friday, and on Saturday Sam and his friend Anna were
here at the farm for cousin activities. They always have plans since they keep
connected by phone and Facebook.

Elijah sang for us at
church on Sunday, and then he was invited to sing again that evening at the
Fifth Sunday Sing, where five or six of our rural churches meet together four
times a year. I missed that since I was
visiting at Katherine’s. Earlier that
day, I think it was, Jeannie had taken
her kids over to Carbondale to visit her alma mater, but she had left a loin
roast in the slow cooker all day, and there were delicious pulled pork
sandwiches for supper when I arrived back home.

Dodging the rain when necessary, Jeannie had, of course,
ridden her bicycle every day—sometimes on local country roads and sometimes
going over to Harrisburg
and getting on the bike trail. On Monday
she started to bike to town, and Gerald and I were relaxing at the dining room
table. Suddenly she appeared with one
hand over an eye with a bloody face and knees.
Broken glasses were in the other hand, and she was saying, “I’m hurt.”
We sprang into action all talking at once--grabbing clean dish towels to soak
up blood and trying to figure out what to do.
Cecelie rescued the damaged bike and brought it to the house.

Their little dog Leah, who had never done such a thing
before, had run in front of Jeannie’s bike on our driveway before she had a
chance to do anything to prevent the bike’s fall and her face going into the
gravel. As soon as we had the blood flow
somewhat stanched, she was calling her insurance company and her husband and
trying to figure out what to do in order to avoid the emergency room if
possible. There were no approved places
in our area for her insurance, but they kindly told here that therefore she
could go anywhere with pre-approval from them.

With a deep looking gash on her face above her eye, we were thinking
plastic surgeon, but the telephone book did not help us. Gerald’s doctor said
to call the hospital for a list, but they put him on hold and we gave up on
that because we wanted to get things taken care of. We did not want to spend
the rest of the day in the ER, and Jeannie did not want to end up unnecessarily
with that enormous expense. I tagged along with Gerald and Jeannie because I
did not want to sit at home not knowing what was going on. The first urgent
care place we went to was closed for lunch.
We went to another.

The girl at the desk was so attentive and assured Jeannie
that the P.A. there did that kind of thing all the time, and Jeannie went in
quickly. Not too much later, she came
out after a tetanus shot and four stitches on her forehead with bandages on her
head and knee. She assured us it had not hurt anything like she thought it
would. By this time, it was well past
lunch time, so we went to a nearby eatery to plot her next move. She had also talked to her eye doctor at Freeport and was hoping
she could have the lenses put in a new unbroken frame, so she could wait to replace
the lenses back with her own doctor. I
could not imagine that anyone could get the one lens, which had some damage in
its corner, out of the frame without breaking it.

We bravely went to Wal-Mart and no one was even at the desk
in the eye center. That seemed like a
bad omen since we saw some other customers sitting closer to the intersanctum. But when that clerk came out, we immediately felt
her concern and expertise. Within a very
short time, she had found a frame among the children’s frames that fit
Jeannie’s lenses exactly, and she had both lenses transferred to the new frame,
which cost $9.09. We were happy campers,
indeed, and were soon back at Woodsong feeling very blessed.

Jeannie, Cecelie, and Elijah were actually on their way to Nashville, TN,
to visit Leslie, whose birthday was Tuesday.
The kids had concert tickets to celebrate. After a little debate, they
decided all was well enough to head to Nashville. Jeannie loaded up her crippled bike on the
back of her van and knew she would be renting a bike in Nashville.
Rick is teaching summer school as usual, and he came through last night
and left his truck here and took Elijah’s car on down to
Leslie and Mike’s for the rest of the week.

The dilapidated Candy Land
game is once again under the flap of the couch in the living room. This is the same game that little Tara used to play and made sure rules were changed as we
went along because even back then she wanted to win. Now it is her sons who play
with Gerald, and the game is interrupted as younger boys join Aidan, who is
very kind to let them join in. I had
forgotten once where I had stored (hidden) the game, but Aidan quickly went to
the couch and pulled it out

Now faded bouquets have all been thrown out, the leftovers eaten
up, the bloody towels soaked and bleached, and we’ve had a calm Independence
Day. I went to Katherine’s most of the
day before an aide arrived, and Mary Ellen came over to the farm. None of the beds have been touched since
people left, but since Eilers will be stopping by on their way back north, I will
let them deal with that.

Tuesday, July 02, 2013

Gerald reported at lunch the other day on the beauty of the
wild flowers in our Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) acres. He wanted to send a bouquet of these to
daughter Katherine, so he invited me to take a tour with him that afternoon to
collect flowers.

We climbed into the Gator and started off first to check out
the little sunflower plants in several plots around the farm. The deer have destroyed one plot and are
working on another, but Gerald has sprayed four plots with deer repellent that
is supposed to keep the deer away. We
will see in another month whether we get to enjoy blossoms on these plots. If we do, the birds will have quite a feast later
when the seeds drop from the bloom center. Although we saw no deer on this
particular day, we did see one circle of smashed grass where they had slept.

Gerald has planted all kinds of hay seed and native grasses
on the CRP land surrounding our home—timothy, lespedeza, red top, alfalfa.
Although there is some work for the farmer involved with this government
program requiring planting, mowing, and sometimes careful burning, it is
pleasant to think of the earth growing richer for future generations and bird
life more abundant for us. Little blue
stem is particularly appealing to Gerald because unlike a dense ground
cover such as fescue, this native grass
has bare spots between the plants, and the quail have room to nest and run
through these little alley ways.

Soon we were over beyond our lake and were riding through lush
tall grasses and abundant patches of flowers--brown-eyed Susans, Queen Anne’s
lace, red and ladino clover, and plants I did not know the name of. Gerald would grab his machete and hop off and
cut tall stems to put into our large box in the back of the Gator. I have heard of sweet clover all my life, but
somehow I thought that was just a generic name for the red and white. Now I have learned that the very tall plants
with lacy leaves and little yellow blossoms are what that term refers to. The
lacy leaves on the stems of partridge pea were as pretty as blossoms to me. All these
were added to the box along with some pretty heads of milkweed, which of course
oozed its milky substance when Gerald cut the stems.

Although we occasionally saw the quite lovely lavender bloom
of thistle plant, we didn’t collect them when Gerald chopped the thorny things
down. I was reminded of my dad paying my
older siblings so much for every one of the thistles they cut from his
pasture. I think I tagged along with
Rosie and Jim but was too young to make any money.

Gerald remembered being paid for collecting pods from the milkweed
plant for the war effort during World War II.
The silky seeds inside were used for life jackets.

Infrequently we saw the brown head of the weed called sour dock,
and I remembered using those seeds for coffee in the play house I created in
two of the angles of the rail fence still remaining at Mount Airy Farm from my
father’s childhood. I loved my mother’s stories about her and her friend Vera’s
adventures, and so I tried to imitate their rail fence play house. (One angle provided a living room area, and
the next angle allowed me to have a kitchen.
I carried in a wooden box for a table and other objects for
furniture.) Gerald clipped me one stalk
of dock in honor of that childhood
memory, and it looked rather nice in the middle of the arrangement I put on our
dining room table, where it matched the brown cloth beneath it.

I am sure part of the reason for this ride around the farm
was to distract me from the sadness of our daughter’s illness, and temporarily
it did. Our box was full and running over, so I had plenty of flowers for a
huge bouquet from Gerald to Katherine, which was especially pretty when he
added a few tiger lilies and orange butterfly weed. There was a bouquet for us, a couple of
blooms for the kitchen table, and a huge arrangement in a bucket for the front
porch. Best of all was the memories stirred up and the memories created of
fields full of golden yellow blossoms swaying midst an abundance of tall warm
season grasses.

The Farm
Service Agency (FSA) website which administers the
Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) for the federal Department of
Agriculture gives this explanation: “In exchange for a yearly rental payment,
farmers enrolled in the program agree to remove environmentally sensitive land
from agricultural production and plant species that will improve environmental
health and quality. Contracts for land enrolled in CRP are 10-15 years in
length. The long-term goal of the program is to re-establish valuable land
cover to help improve water quality, prevent soil erosion, and reduce loss of
wildlife habitat.”

I wrote a blog three two days ago, and I liked it altho I had not had time to edit it yet. I was going to copy it to have Gerald check the ag facts and spellings. So started to copy it from the many-day blog entries and put it on a separate document and then print it out for him to see. Somehow someway, I not only lost the blog post completely on Word--but a crazy half light blue page that will not let me use a cursor has shown up on the long many-day original copy of the blog that I write on instead of directly on here as I am doing now. Don't know what happened and I cannot get rid of it on Word. If I never hlog again, you will understand that I am too frustrated until I get this problem solved. And computer stuff bumfuzzles me, so I may never be able to solve and use Word again. We will see what the future holds. Ha.

About Me

I am the mother of four adult children and the wife of a retired farmer living in our retirement home on lake he built on our farm. I have always loved to write and enjoy having you read my writing. My book Down on the Farm: One Anerican Family's Dream is available now. Drop by the farm and I will autograph your copy.
Down on the Farm is a great gift book tht would be appreciated by young parents, who are struggling or enjoying rearing children, and also by older people, who like to ride down memory lane. I have been surprised that men have seemed to enjoy the book as much as women do.